1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to printers that receive requests to print on different media, and relates more particularly to a printer that enables efficient system maintenance and system changes. The disclosure also relates to a printing control method, and to a recording medium storing a printing control program.
2. Related Art
Systems developed for the airline industry and used by airline employees to issue boarding passes, for example, are commonly used in airports. Such systems normally have a host device that generates print request data for boarding passes and other printouts in response to commands issued by the operator, and printers that interpret the print request data and produce the printouts.
These printers produce multiple different types of output, including business class boarding passes, economy class boarding passes, and boarding pass exchange coupons, and different types of paper may be used for each type of printout (type of print media). The content and type of printout may also differ according to the airline.
Such systems are commonly maintained by the airport operator and used by the individual airline companies.
JP-A-2010-52421 discloses technology that uses a daisy chain connection to print multiple types of output.
Even though multiple types of output may be printed on the system used in airports as described above, print requests are preferably output from the host device to a single printer, that is, to one target device. This normally requires a printer with multiple supply trays (bins) and paper paths.
As described above, however, the number of types of printouts produced may differ according to the airline companies that use the system, and plural types of printers may therefore be required to accommodate the different companies. This is inefficient in terms of maintenance and management because multiple different types of spare printers and parts must be kept in stock, for example.
When the airline companies using the system change, such as when a new airline starts service at an airport, changing printers to meet the printing needs of the airline may be necessary, and the resulting cost of equipment is high. This is also not an infrequent need in airports, the resulting problem is therefore important, and a system that can respond efficiently and flexibly to individual airline needs is desirable.
Furthermore, the airport system described above outputs a print request from the host to one printer, and receives one response to the request from the printer. JP-A-2010-52421 does not address responding in this way through a daisy chain connection.